[tmvijai]

hey swanson

I should say your idea to invest in rental property is a good one. I also should acolode you for funding your emergency fund first before thinking about investing. Not many people do that. I have seen many people come to real estate seminar don't even know what is emergency fund. You are atleast good planner.

Being a student of financial planning, I should say you are in the right track but how close are you to achieve victory is the true question. You got $7k of emergency fund. You annual income $60k - $5K net/month and $1000 pending after paying bills which is a solid earning. I would say you have to atleast $4k * 3-6 months of emergency fund = $12k - 24k in the higher end before even start thinking about any money for investing. That would your safest bet.

I was in your same situation 3 years ago. I had good emergency fund savings and invested in my 1st rental property with $20 down including closing cost. My EF reduced to just $5k which was a mistake. I lost my job and I was in a panic mode. Luckily I got job in a month otherwise I would have been a mess. THats a tough lesson learned. For you, you don't have to worry about job loss but still disability and other factors still valid for you.

After saying all that, I am still kinda of attracted by the deal $30k investment property with just $6k down. Good deal but rental amount doesn't seems to be really attractive. You have to calculate vacany rate, maintenance into account not just insurance and mortgage and decide on the cash flow. That would be around $100/month which is still not bad. Also you need to see 3-6months out. How can you manage without tenant? You said, you can pay mortgage out of your pocket which is actually loss for you.

So taking all into consideration, I would sit out and wait until you build atleast $15k of EF. Real estate market is going nowhere.